PROFILE: Lithuania’s master builder

Algirdas Brazauskas

European Voice

9/5/01, 5:00 PM CET

Updated 4/12/14, 7:05 AM CET

FOR a moment, Algirdas Mykolas Brazauskas, 68, was Lithuania’s most famous pensioner.

That lasted until the opportunity to become prime minister drew him back into the Baltic state’s political life – which he had already experienced thoroughly at every level from his selection as a member of the Lithuanian Communist Party’s politburo in 1977 through his presidential term of 1993-98.

On 26 June this year, President Valdas Adamkus appointed Social Democratic leader Brazauskas as prime minister of Lithuania. Brazauskas is the country’s most popular politician, but also the former first secretary of its Communist Party.

With Brazauskas’ appointment, Lithuania joined the other previously socialist countries in which former Communist leaders have returned to the top of the political heap.

Brazauskas is a construction engineer by education – a skill which he has implemented in his political career, according to those close to him. He served as minister of the building materials industry in 1965-68, before being named as deputy chairman of the state planning committee. Brazauskas was considered due for retirement, but because of his popularity is once again at the top.

He was at the forefront of Lithuania’s push for independence from the Soviet Union in 1989-1990, becoming the country’s president three years later.

His Communist background has not been held against him by the majority of Lithuania’s 3.7 million population, who view him as a patriot and a safe pair of hands.

Brazauskas describes himself as a social democrat who supports a “socially-orientated market economy” inspired by the Scandinavian or German model. He claims that only a small percentage of the Lithuanians were truly Communist, and that the country’s Communist Party was merely a formal necessity to which there was no workable political alternative at the time.

During the Soviet era, Lithuania always had a slightly detached relationship with its Communist masters in Moscow. Although Soviet troops were a familiar sight on the streets of the other Baltic capitals of Riga and Tallinn, their appearances were much rarer in Vilnius.

Brazauskas says he was largely left to get on with the job of administering the country.

The new Lithuanian cabinet, inaugurated by Adamkus in July, was formed by members of the Social Democratic Party and the Social Liberal Party. It also includes several unaffiliated ministers.

The president seems to have had his way in ensuring that its composition would not result in any significant ideological shift compared with the previous left-leaning government led by Rolandas Paksas.

Of the 13 ministers in the Paksas government, six retained their portfolios, including Foreign Minister Antanas Valionis, Minister of Defence Linas Linkevicius and Minister of Agriculture Romuldas Dobrovolskis.

Although only three of the ministers are Social Democrats, Brazauskas appears to have no complaints. He insists he is happy to concentrate on the major challenges Lithuania faces – especially in revitalising its economy.

Brazauskas has said he is not content with Lithuania’s current average growth rate of 4.4% – lower than neighbouring Estonia and Latvia – and has targeted an annual rate of 5-7%.

Another matter of concern is Lithuania’s state debt, which is up to 13.12 billion litas (3.6 billion euro). The government has launched a privatisation programme in a bid to reduce the deficit. According to some sources, the state’s 92% holding in the Lietuvos Dujos gas company is set to be slashed to 34%. Brazauskas, however, has been quick to say that no final decision has been made on the scale of the sell-off, arguing that any privatisations must be to the benefit of Lithuania.

This follows strong criticism by the Social Democrats of the way in which the Lietuvos Telekomas and Mazeiku Nafta companies were privatised. The sale of Lithuania’s telecom firm, for instance, has left the state without any means to influence tariffs.

The right-wing opposition, led by former prime minister and potential presidential candidate Andrius Kubilius, has accused Brazauskas of making contradictory statements about the privatisation programme, causing uncertainty.

However, the opposition attacks have been largely blunted owing to the cautions approach of the new Minister of Finance, Dalia Grybauskaite, a politically-unaffiliated career civil servant.

She has blocked any additional social spending and the government has quietly dropped its calls for a progressive taxation system.

The major foreign policy issues facing the Brazauskas government are EU and NATO membership – and both are seen as being directly linked to Lithuania’s economy. Lithuania has made good progress in the EU enlargement talks, with 19 chapters of the negotiations so far concluded and more to be added in the near future.

It hopes to join the Union with the ‘first wave’ of newcomers in 2004, but the most difficult issues lie ahead – on agriculture, energy and the environment. Lithuania’s farmers, in particular, have major concerns about EU membership, saying it will leave them worse off.

The new government also faces a major headache over the planned closure of the Ignalina nuclear power plant. Brazauskas wants the European Commission to cover some of the estimated 1 billion euro cost of decommissioning two Chernobyl-type reactors at the site. “There is no ground to believe that Lithuania will be capable of sutting down the plant with its own financial resources,” he said recently in an interview with European Voice.

Brazauskas has warned that it will result in the loss of 35,000 jobs and have serious social consequences for of the local city, Visaginas.

Despite his focus on economic policy, Brazauskas plans to continue the previous government’s policy in relation to NATO, which it hopes to join in 2002.

Lithuania has a relatively large defence budget at 2% of GNP and along with its Baltic neighbours, Estonia and Latvia, is considered a serious candidate for membership of the Alliance. It is thought possible that NATO will invite all three Baltic states to begin membership negotiations at its Prague summit in November.

Although unthinkable barely a decade ago, Brazauskas sees membership of the EU and NATO as vital to Lithuania’s future.

Elena Leontjeva, the respected director of Lithuania’s independent Market Economy Institute, told The Baltic Times that Brazauskas is primarily a moral leader, driven by pragmatism rather than ideology.

But for his enlargement hopes to become a reality, Brazauskas still has much to do – and not just where the economy is concerned.

He must persuade outsiders that he is capable of rooting out corruption in a bureaucracy that still has one foot in the past.

He must tighten cooperation with the other Baltic states and Nordic countries, which has too often consisted more of words than deeds in the past decade.

And he must toughen border controls with the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad, a Naval base plagued by organised crime, pollution and health problems.

In his first visit to Brussels since taking office, Brazauskas assured Enlargement Commissioner Gunter Verheugen that such issues would be his priority in the coming months.

There is no question that Brazauskas has the will to transform Lithuania into a truly modern economy, but questions will be asked about whether he has the energy to see the job through. At 68, it’s a tall order.

1932: Born in Rokiõkis, Lithuania

1956: Graduated in civil engineering at Kaunas Polytechnic Institute

1965-1967: Minister of Building Materials Industry

1967: Appointed deputy chairman of the State Planning Committee

1977-1987: Secretary of economic affairs of the Communist Party of Lithuania

1988: First secretary of the Communist Party

1990-1991: Vice prime minister of the first independent government of Lithuania